the one you're with
by brinnanza
Summary: Sidney has one last patient after the bonfire. Coda for 6x4 War of Nerves. Sidney/Hawkeye, BJ/Hawkeye


The singing dies down, but the bonfire is still crackling away, wisps of smoke drifting skyward into the Korean night. The camp has fallen curiously silent, save for the pop and hiss of burning things, crates and ladders and tension and Sidney's fatigues. In a moment, Sidney knows, the crowd will dissipate and the familiar background chatter of the 4077th will resume, but for now, the hush is a welcome change from artillery and arguments.

He bids Colonel Potter goodnight with a silent nod of his head and returns to his tent. In the morning, he'll go back to Seoul until he's needed again (or until the next poker game, whichever comes first) but he expects one last visitor. It's even odds as to whether it will be at Colonel Potter's sternly-voiced recommendation or of his own volition.

Sidney's redressed in spare fatigues when Hawkeye finally raps at the door of the VIP tent. He doesn't bother to wait for a response, just ducks in with his customary manic grin, the smell of wood smoke clinging to his clothes. His expression flickers for just a moment when he notes Sidney's state of dress, which he draws out as an overdramatic affectation that slides into a leer. "Now we'll have to start all over!"

He glances at Sidney expectantly. The next line here is something about delayed gratification and how it's more fun that way, but Sidney doesn't give it. Instead, Hawkeye drops his leer and draws out a bottle of slightly amber-tinted liquid from his shirt pocket. He waggles it at Sidney. "You got any glasses?"

"Scotch," Sidney reads off of the label. "Little pale for that, isn't it?" He rounds up two glasses and splashes a couple of fingers in each.

"Well, it's a pale imitation of scotch," Hawkeye says, taking the glass Sidney hands him.

"Meaning it's mostly gin?"

Hawkeye's grin quirks up again, crinkling the corners of his eyes. "Hey, you catch on quick!"

They knock their glasses together and drink. The lighter fluid burn of Hawkeye's homemade rotgut masks anything that might have been added by the scotch, but drinking in Korea is very rarely about the taste.

There's a mischievous curl in Hawkeye's lip as he gives Sidney an appraising look over the rim of his glass, making no effort to disguise the heat in his gaze. Sidney tries to maintain a neutral expression in deference to his profession, but the yellow lamplight does little to obscure Hawkeye's rakish features and bright eyes. The line between the personal and the professional is blurry enough when it comes to Sidney's friends, and Hawkeye crosses it as he pleases.

Hawkeye plucks the glass from Sidney's hand and sets it on the table next to his empty one before stepping in close, electricity crackling in the scant space between them. He slides his hands slowly up Sidney's chest before grasping the lapels of his shirt. "Are you going to burn these too," he purrs, leaning in, "or will you settle for leaving them on the floor?"

All of Sidney's lost patients, all of his failures, crackle inside him, desert-dry like kindling. He wants to toss them on the bonfire too, let Hawkeye's clever tongue and skilled hands burn them all away until soft ash is all that remains. Hawkeye is close enough now that Sidney can feel the warm puff of his breath and Sidney's eyes drift closed, resolve wavering.

Hawkeye has a surgeon's talent for kissing, born of close study and many long nights of practice. He presses soft lips against Sidney's, impossibly gentle. When Sidney doesn't pull away, he tilts his chin just slightly and skims his tongue over Sidney's bottom lip, seeking entrance.

Sidney has his own skills, a knack for psychiatry and a sense of professionalism chief among them. After a moment that is simultaneously too long and too short, he takes hold of Hawkeye's wrists and steps back to put some space between them. "I'm not sure this is a good idea."

"Alright, so it's a bad idea," Hawkeye says, his mouth chasing after Sidney's. "Fortunately, I happen to specialize in bad ideas."

Sidney releases Hawkeye's wrists and lays a quelling hand on his chest. Hawkeye tilts his head, a wrinkle in his brow. "Sidney, come on," he says, just enough of a whine in his voice that Sidney can hear his disappointment in more than just an interrupted assignation.

"I'm saying no, Hawkeye," Sidney says gently.

Hawkeye backs up and crosses his arms over his chest, a petulant twist in his lip. "Y'know, if this is you trying to tell me you're not queer, I happen to have a fair few nights of mutually enjoyable evidence that begs to differ." His expression shifts abruptly and he smirks, waggling his eyebrows suggestively. "As I recall, some of them involved begging."

Sidney lets out a slow breath and reaches for the liquor bottle again. He tips some more gin into his discarded cup and curls both hands around it. "I'm not saying that," he says. Hawkeye has been very enjoyable company in the past and hopefully will be in the future, but it's getting late and Sidney's head hurts, and he values Hawkeye's friendship too much to pretend things between them are still as simple as they used to be. "Are you sure this is what you want?"

"Of course it is," Hawkeye says. "I came to you, remember? I got no problem playing nurse, but sometimes I'd rather play doctor with another doctor if you know what I mean. What's different this time?"

Sidney crosses to sit on the edge of the cot. It's easier now, with much of the tent between them, to slip into a more professional demeanor. "Oh, lots of things," he says, deliberately offhandedly. "A little time, a little distance. Different people in your life." He arches an eyebrow significantly.

Hawkeye stares at him. "What, _BJ_?" he says incredulously.

Sidney shrugs, somehow unsurprised that Hawkeye would manage to get right to the point of the subject he's avoiding. "You said it, not me."

"Are you _jealous_?" It's clearly meant to be a scoff, but there's just a little too much sincerity in it. Hawkeye snatches the liquor bottle off of the table, not bothering with a glass. "There's nothing going on between me and BJ," he says, pointing the mouth of the bottle at Sidney. He takes a swig from it. "BJ is _married_."

"So am I," Sidney points out. "Didn't stop me."

"Yeah, but BJ's not married like you're married or like Frank Burns is married."

Sidney takes a sip of his own drink. "I think I resent that comparison," he says mildly.

Hawkeye flaps a dismissive hand at him and takes another drink. He's pacing now, back and forth across the tent like one of Radar's caged animals. "You know what I mean."

"I do?"

Hawkeye blows out a frustrated breath. "The point is," he says, shoving a hand through his hair, "BJ is very happily and heterosexually married, and there's nothing going on between us. There's nothing to go on between us. He loves his wife, and I -" He forces a laugh, but his words are picking up speed. "Well, you know me. I'll love anything that'll have me."

Sidney just waits for him to wind down, sipping his gin and tracking Hawkeye's quick steps and fluttering hands.

"He's probably the best friend I've ever had," Hawkeye continues, "and it finally no longer feels like I'm betraying Trapper to say that. He's - he's the only thing that gets me through it some days. It's fine. It's great. Perfect even! Who can ask for more than that in this hellhole?"

Sidney suspects he is not exactly the intended recipient of this claim. "Nothing wrong with asking," he says. "You might be surprised at the answer."

Hawkeye rounds on him jabbing a finger at him. "Oh no, there is plenty wrong with asking. If you don't ask, you can't get shot down."

Sidney lifts his eyebrows at that. Hawkeye makes a pass at nearly everyone he meets, and he's not exactly batting a thousand. Nurse Bigelow has been turning him down for most of the war, and he hasn't yet stopped asking. "You also can't get a yes."

"Fortunately," Hawkeye says, "there's nothing to ask. BJ and I are friends. Maybe it looks a little different to you cause we're both trying to pull each other out of the mud here, but you have to have seen your fair share of closer-than-normal army buddies."

"I have," Sidney allows.

"Okay, so, see? Just cause we're living in each other's pockets doesn't mean we're - anything else. BJ's not even - he's married." Hawkeye drops into the chair across from Sidney, all the fight going out of him abruptly. In a soft voice Sidney is probably not meant to hear, he mutters, "I'm not doing that again."

The polite thing, Sidney knows, would be to pretend he hadn't heard it. He's found there isn't always a lot of room in psychiatry for politeness, and that goes double where Hawkeye is concerned. "Not doing what again?"

Hawkeye's head jerks up sharply. "What?"

Sidney recognizes the technique readily as buying time to think of a good lie. With Hawkeye, a lie is almost as telling as the truth, so Sidney lets him have it. "You said, 'I'm not doing that again'. Not doing what again?"

"Nothing, I - it didn't mean anything," Hawkeye says, floundering. "Just, you know, have this conversation again." He gestures between them vaguely.

"Do you have this conversation often?"

"Look, Sidney," Hawkeye says, voice raised. He gets to his feet again so he can scowl down at Sidney. "I didn't come here as a patient."

"That's convenient," Sidney says. "I didn't come here as a doctor."

"Sidney -"

Sidney leans forward and looks up at Hawkeye, bracing his elbows on his knees. "Hawkeye, can I give you a piece of advice?"

Hawkeye's lips tighten fractionally. "Only if you promise not to charge."

"It's on the house," Sidney agrees. He gestures at the chair and Hawkeye sits, watching him warily, prepared to brush off anything he doesn't like with another joke. Sidney releases a slow breath. "You can lie to an awful lot of people," he says, "but you rarely get anywhere by lying to yourself." Hawkeye opens his mouth to argue, and Sidney puts his hands up. "Look, tell BJ how you feel about him or don't. You don't even have to tell me. But tell yourself at least."

"There's nothing to tell!" Hawkeye protests.

A wry smile tugs at the corner of Sidney's mouth. "I'll be here when you change your mind," he says. "And in the meantime…" He gets to his feet and holds a hand just over Hawkeye's shoulder, ushering him up and toward the door. "...I will wish you goodnight."

Hawkeye stands, but instead of leaving, he sidles up close to Sidney, settling his hands on his hips. He tucks his thumbs under Sidney's waistband, just enough to reach skin. "Are you sure I can't convince you to reconsider?" he says, pitching his voice low.

It's a valiant last ditch effort, but Sidney's not going to help Hawkeye lie to himself. "I'm quite certain you could," he says, and Hawkeye's eyes widen before settling into a heavy-lidded, self-satisfied expression. "Which is why I am saying goodnight."

Hawkeye's face falls, and he withdraws his hands. "Sidney!"

"My standard advice applies, as always," Sidney continues, grasping Hawkeye's shoulders to turn him around toward the door.

"That's what I was trying -"

"See you at next week's poker game."

Hawkeye crosses his arms and pouts, shedding his years like used surgical gloves, and Sidney suddenly feels very old. Funny, he's almost positive he'd still felt young when he'd left for Korea.

"Fine," Hawkeye says, "but don't be surprised if my bunk is occupied when you change your mind and come after me."

"I'll try to contain my disappointment," Sidney says, and Hawkeye ducks out of the tent.

Sidney sits down on the bed again, unties his boots, and lays back. He has no doubt in Hawkeye's ability to find some extracurricular company if he desires it. It's possible that even now, he's heading over to the nurses' tent to beg, borrow, or steal a kiss (and more).

But Sidney's been in this business a long time. If he were a betting man (and he is, judging by how much the thickness of his wallet changes on Thursday nights), he'd lay good odds on Hawkeye spending the remainder of his waking hours exchanging bad jokes and drinks with his tentmate, pretending not to want something he's too afraid to ask for, even if the answer might be yes.


End file.
